Measuring EU Inflation: The Foundations of the HICP

The HICP is a consumer price index which was designed to provide measures of inflation in EU member states calculated using similar methods and thus comparable one with another. The HICP now tracks the inflation rates covering over 500 million Europeans, including the UK, and is also produced by other countries such as the USA. John Astin was the EU statistician in charge of the initial development of this important index and he has the best knowledge of how it was developed in the 1990s. This book is a history of the main development period of the HICP, up to the year 2002 when Astin left the European Commission. It will be of interest to a wide range of readers, not only in the UK but globally. Types of readers are likely to include: economists, economic statisticians, national statistics offices, universities, libraries, government finance/economic ministries, international organizations such as UN, ILO, OECD, EU, Eurostat, ECB, and central banks, as well as individuals whoare interested in the construction of consumer price indices.

This book begins by explaining the background to the HICP project, both from an economic and a political viewpoint, and describes the specific needs for harmonized price indices resulting from the Maastricht treaty of 1992. It analyses the process of establishing the necessary procedures for taking this urgent work forward and gives details of the technical issues involved, and the critical issue of drafting legal acts which would be necessary to ensure full compliance with the new rules. It includes analysis of products, price collection issues, quality adjustment, timing, and a host of other issues, and discusses the arguments which had to be resolved, as well as some human aspects of the process too. It also looks at the funding aspects, the recruitment of specialist consultants, the legal processes and the organization of meetings, both in Luxembourg and in other countries.